Peter Piper Picked a Perfect Pumpkin

Yesterday I went to a local farm to pick a pumpkin with my son. Why? Honestly, because Facebook told me to. As a first time parent I am in that awkward, scared of my child missing out on anything even though he’s one and doesn’t have a clue what’s going on stage. I’m not quite as bad as some of the Pinterest perfect parents, I don’t have the time or money for that. I’d just like to set some nice traditions and sometimes I’m not sure where to start so for now I’ll shamelessly and blindly copy what other parents are doing. I’ve never been pumpkin picking in my life. My very busy working mum of four usually grabbed one from the shop on her way home on the day. One year we were so last minute we ended up with a delicious smelling pineapple lantern. Hard work to carve but I really liked it. It had great hair. Remembering my mums efforts fondly I watched my son totter around the muddy field and realised this was actually a fun way to spend an afternoon.

How you choose to source something can make a huge difference to the quality of your acquisition , you also learn a lot about something when searching for it yourself because basically if you want to find something good you have to. It was while we were hunting I noticed the similarities between the hunt for a great pumpkin and a great candidate. It’s vital to understand exactly what you are looking for and the more you know about it the better. I thought people would be fighting over the same pumpkin but when I looked around I realised that most people were on their own mission to find something different, their own idea of the perfect pumpkin.

With no plans or lantern design ideas of my own I looked around and watched some of the other pickers to try to get an idea of what to go for. Of course it has to be a nice bright orange I thought… but not for that family to my left, one of the kids wanted to make a Frankenstein style lantern. The green pumpkin I’d just stepped over would be perfect for that but I wasn’t going to point it out to them, you can’t approach kids in a field without looking like a weirdo.. I’m sure they’d see it at some point. Bigger is always better isn’t it? That’s why they’re priced according to size.. but as the, very well put together, lady in front of me strutted off happily with her medium sized one find I imagined it was the just the right size for the space in her probably perfect Halloween display. I’m assuming all of that, but she looked that type. Good for her. Then I found a few that were perfectly rounded yet had sort of flat edges so they stoodon their own and looked great, absolutely what every pumpkin picker needs, according to the websites ( I checked )so why didthat fella who walked past them look so made up with a huge misshapen one that had rolled on its side? As we paid the farmer I overheard him telling her ( I know, it’s shocking how nosey I am ) that it was perfectly ripe and he was going to make a pie .

It is the same as the hunt for talent, employers are looking for qualities specific to their needs. I also read that pumpkins sometimes pick you, again the same can be said for candidates, providing your employer branding is accurate, then the right people will be a lot more likely to find their way to you. This happened to me, my pumpkin pretty much shouted out to me across the patch.It was mostly rounded with one sort of flat side, it made me laugh because it reminded me of my sister’s head when she was born. Our beautiful little pumpkin head. Starting this tradition meant that I also ended up with a tiny disfigured, multi-coloured, can’t stand up on it’s own, simply terrible looking pumpkin. That was the one my little boy picked himself and became strangely attached to so that was what I wanted.